Tag Archives: Edgar Rice Burroughs

Classic Monster Magazines

Marvel Movie Premiere #1: The Land that Time Forgot (Curtis Magazines, 1975)

Last week, we inducted the British quad poster for this movie into our Classic Movie Poster Gallery so it only makes sense to feature this classic movie magazine for the same Amicus film, The Land That Time Forgot.

This was a one-shot magazine published in 1975 that featured a very tight adaptation of the Amicus film, The Land That Time Forgot, released around the same time that same year. The film released in August and this magazine had September date. I wish I could recall what came first for me – the magazine or the movie. My guess is the magazine was my gateway since I spent as much time as possible at the comic rack whenever I went shopping with my parents/ By 1975, I was also regularly buying Famous Monsters off the magazine rack, and the fantastic cover for this book would have kept out at me.

Curtis Magazines

Marvel attempted to enter the comics-magazine field dominated by Warren Publishing through a sister company, Curtis Magazines. the new line of mostly black-and-white anthology magazines predominantly featured horror, sword and sorcery, and science fiction. Most Curtis magazines did not carry the Marvel name, making this title a bit of an exception. ‘Marvel’ is included in the title of the magazine, but Curtis is still the imprint. This was probably a case of wanting their cake and eat it too — trying to capture the older black-and-white magazine audience, but at least with this one title, also wanting to attract the younger audience of their mainstream Marvel Comics titles.

While most of the Curtis magazines took full advantage of the fact that the format did not fall under the purview of the Comics Code, by incorporating more graphic content — such as moderate profanity, partial nudity, and more graphic violence — Marvel Movie Premiere #1 avoided that trend, probably for the simple reason that the movie they were adapting didn’t include any of that content.

Title Page & Contents

The Land That Time Forgot

Our sense-shattering adaptation of the fantastic film released by American International Pictures and based on the nerve-numbing novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs.

Adaptation by Marv Wolfman & Art by Sonny Trinidad.

Special Feature! Lost Lands; Forbidden Cities!

A look at the lost worlds of Edgar Rice Burroughs and other fantasy masters of our time! By Lin Carter

Movie Photo Feature: The Land That Time Forgot

Back Cover

(I simply love the aquatic T-Rex!)

Collectors Value:

Current price guide listings for this title value Near Mint copies at $14. This book has had higher value in the past but is currently not highly sought after by collectors. Hold on to your copy, as I expect it will continue to increase in value over time.

One of the factors impacting prices may be the wide availability of this book. There are numerous current eBay listings for this issue under or around $10 for high-grade copies. As always, there are a few listings from uninformed sellers who haven’t bothered to research other listings and are asking for silly prices, but that’s always the case, isn’t it?

I have 2 copies of this book. The scans in this article are from my Near Mint copy. I also have a nice reader copy, probably Fine to Fine+ that I love to look at.

Summary

I never get tired of this book, just as I still have strong affection for the movie poster and the film itself. I’m always transported back to 1975 when my innocent, excited eyes first saw this magazine at he news stand. It’s a strong and meaningful memory of an important time in my life when I was discovering life-long passions and starting to chart my own course. Magical stuff for this Monster Kid…

Classic Movie Poster Gallery

The Land That Time Forgot (Amicus, 1975) U.K. Quad 30″ x 40″

I saw this movie at the theater when I was 9 years old. Plain and simple – it had everything I could ask for. I loved Tarzan, dinosaurs, cavemen, submarines….this movie had it all. One of the last pulp fantasy-adventure films before Star Wars changed everything, The Land That Time Forgot remains indelibly printed in my memory as one of the great movies of my childhood.

This is the British quad poster for the film, and while it isn’t the same one my 9 year-old self fell in love with in the mid-70s, today it is my favorite poster for the film. The day-glow title letters really does it for me and ties the poster together visually by matching the vibrant orange of the exploding volcano. The utter ridiculousness of the submerged T-Rex battling the German U-Boat (spoiler alert: NOT in the film) adds to the overall camp and the utter joy I feel when looking at this poster.

The art, by the great Tom Chantrell, is simply magnificent — click on the images below to take a closer look:

Here’s a terrific overview of Chantrell’s career and impact from BFI.uk.org:

Celebrated poster designer Tom Chantrell, whose prolific career took in everything from Brighton Rock (1947) to Star Wars (1977), also worked for both production houses. For a while Chantrell was ‘house artist’ at Hammer, bringing a ghoulish relish to the campaigns for everything the studio put out between The Nanny (1965) and Taste the Blood of Dracula (1969).

This iconic image for the 1966 prehistoric adventure One Million Years B.C. is typical of Chantrell’s partiality for bold lettering and what film poster scholar Sim Branaghan calls “a riot of brilliantly deployed colour across epic, wonderfully composed canvases.”

Chantrell was the man that Amicus would call on when it embarked on its own series of ancient-world fantasies, derived from the novels of Edgar Rice Burroughs. Each starring Doug McClure and directed by Kevin Connor, this sequence began with 1975’s The Land That Time Forgot, the First World War story of survivors from a torpedoed ship coming across a lost continent where dinosaurs still roam. Chantrell’s action-packed poster enticingly contrasts a German U-boat with exciting primordial drama, while the brash red of the title font is matched to the florid lava of an erupting volcano.

With changing fashion and the rise of computer-aided graphic design in the early 80s, the illustrative craft of designers like Tom Chantrell would soon be a thing of the past. So these eye-catching Amicus posters represent some of the final glories of a lost art.

Synopsis:

TheLand That Time Forgot starts with the torpedoing of a passenger ship by a German U-boat crew. The few remaining survivors, including Bowen Tyler (McClure) and Lisa Clayton (Penhaligon), manage to overcome the U-boat’s crew when it surfaces and they force the captain to pilot the craft back to allied waters. The crew decide to sabotage their plans and the craft ends up completely lost in unknown waters. They happen across a strange island and find an underwater cave through which they pilot the U-boat. When they surface in the islands interior they are immediately set upon by a dinosaur-like creature that eats one of the crew before Tyler manages to decapitate it. The crew then venture through the strange land and come across more giant beasts and a tribe of primitive cavemen before discovering oil, which they hope will allow them to escape back to civilisation.

Here’s the film trailer for your viewing pleasure:

Poster Value

High-grade copies of this poster are usually priced in the $500 range. The combination of Tom Chantrell‘s gorgeous art for a Edgar Rice Burrough’s dinosaur vs submarine adventure movie make this a poster that will continue to be desirable for collectors and genre fans for a long, long time.

Grade A copy of this quad poster is offered for 275GBP ($429 U.S.) at Frontrowposters

Tom Chantrell’s estate has partnered with BFI to offer original posters from his collection through their website ChantrellPosters.com – the quad isn’t available but high quality UK double-crown poster (20″x 30″) is listed for 145GBP ($226 U.S.)

Summary

What can I say; this film does it for me. It was a perfect stew of everything I loved as a nine-year-old and the affection I have for it hasn’t lessened over the years. While it’s effects weren’t high quality even for the time period, with rubber dinosaurs and amateurish cave man makeup, the story was great fun and packed with thrills. It’s pure, unadulterated camp and I love every second of it.